All things considered, things could have gone really a bit worse. The day started off relatively mild with her aunt snapping the door to the cupboard unlocked followed with a waspish command to do the breakfast, which as usual resulted in some form of mild injury, mainly a scalding of her fingers from having to stand so close to the hob on a chair due to her unimpressive height. Once the palarva of dividing four and a half meals between three people (mainly two in all honest), it was a case of trundling back into the cupboard to ensure her threadbare uniform sat correctly before slinking out the door and into the car for her and her cousin to be sent to school. It never occurred to Aster that the postman's tardiness from his usual eight o'clock posting would be an issue to come.

The school day itself was rather unremarkable, she kept her head down and remained unobserved to the masses as she worked her letters, struggled over her numbers and drew unimpressionable art. Her lunch was even a rare good day as Dudley and his goons set their eyes elsewhere and on the new boy who had the unfortunate quality of being smart. It was when they got home which was the issue.

At quarter to four exactly (for Aunt Petunia was nothing if not adamant that no delays should be had regardless of matters like traffic), Petunia, Dudley and Aster walked through the front door of the clinically pristine Four Privet Drive. Petunia clicked her way into her domain, Dudley stomped his way in an amazing replica of an elephant, all over the four envelopes that laid on the doormat. As Aster saw them, she knew that she was going to get it in the neck for the post not being pristine white. Once she picked them up, rubbing as much dirt from the imprinted boot step of her cousin's foot, she saw something rather interesting: a letter for her.

Due to this extraordinary turn of events she understandably hadn't been aware that the front door was still open but her aunt had. Her aunt, who had turned the corner to lambast about letting the heat out (despite it being the height of summer and thus this would in fact be a blessing and not worthy of contempt). At the sight of her wayward niece staring gormlessly at an envelope, the nosey little brat, she stormed her way and snatched the lot out of her hands, slamming the front door. It wasn't until she looked at the addressee, and address itself in all honesty, which caused her to stop mid step herself.

How would they know she slept under the stairs?! Flipping the exceedingly thick and expensive parchment (for she horrifyingly recalled the feel of this material from letters decades ago, the last being ten years ago in November), the dreaded logo stared up at her. Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Why couldn't they leave her lovely ordinary family alone?

Oblivious to all this, Aster was frowning up at her aunt as her face turned a curious shade of grey. Why did she take her post? She never got post! Or at least she didn't think she did, unless the postman was under order not to deliver any and this had simply slipped through, or her aunt and uncle somehow managed to set up a timing for her post to come through as she always sorted through the delivery. Either way, she wanted that letter. It was addressed to her. Such a simple thing that most overlooked, kids like her cousin only got letters when it was a reprimand from the school, or a boring old birthday card from elderly relatives and adults complained that their post was nothing but bills and grabs for money from catalogues which were taking custom away from the high street (according to Uncle Vernon anyway), but as someone who had little to call theirs, and what they did was given so reluctantly, the idea that there was another person out there reaching out to her was a privilege she didn't want taken away, even if it ended up being nothing but a reprimand. It meant someone had thought of her without thinking of her walrus of an uncle, whale of a cousin or wasp of an aunt.

However despite her protestations to Aunt Petunia, she was unable to grasp her letter back, and the tantrum she had caused in that dowdy and spotless hallway caused her to be locked into the cupboard with a sharp tone to "not go telling her uncle about any letters as it was clearly a mistake". Which was pointless, why would she tell him? He was worse than Aunt Petunia as he encouraged his "strapping boy" to bully Aster mercilessly, told her aunt that she only needed one piece of burnt dry toast as she was only a small slip of a girl. At least her aunt ignored her for the most part. As such, she would keep mute on this most wonderful occurrence, and hoped that when she didn't respond they would promptly send a follow up letter, and she'd keep an eagle eye on the post that would come through each day so she could pounce on it before her aunt would come across it again, or worse her uncle or cousin.

As such, her being locked up in the cupboard without dinner wasn't the worst that could have come from not only her getting something and her aunt finding out but also from her insubordination at having said something taken away immediately after getting it. Honestly it was down right shocking almost at the lack of anything other being done, like a ruler across her knuckles. But then again, Aunt Petunia was better than Uncle Vernon.

And so she sat in her cupboard with the blinking low watt bulb creating elongated shadows enough that she could entertain herself by making shadow puppets out of the small things she had squirreled away. She created a homemade projection movie out of the broken plastic soldiers she had walking across the vast plains of an old textbook, to get to the insurmountable mountain of jumper sleeve (with her arm still in at an angle for it to look just so) to reach the promised trophy of the Red Colour Pencil Stub. When that got tiring she crouched to the very back corner and slipped out one of the two books she had kept hidden away, even though they were reluctantly given to her by Aunt Petunia after Dudley declared that only stupid people read and so fit her to a tee (apparently he's ever such a generous boy for saying so).

The book was well worn, the paper on the spine flaking off from the amount of use it had seen, the front page scratched and peeling from the scrapes it endured from being dragged on rough hewn wood. The pages curled ever so slightly, the clearly favourite pages had the stems of now disintegrated leaves marking the places of which were frequently read repeatedly in times of distress.

And so Aster's night passed rather peaceably, reading a lovely book in her cupboard, ignoring the hunger pangs in her belly as she was used to do. She was unaware however that her aunt was silently panicking at the thought of another one of those were in her respectable home, wondering if there was any way to bring this up to Vernon without an explosion of temper, because although the girl was a weird little brat, she didn't quite deserve a thrashing that this information would bring. After all, what would the neighbours think if they heard?!

Overseeing all this, the two Primordials looked on in disgust as this woman debased her neice for a gene in which she held within herself and would pass on to her own grandchildren. Magic swirled in her indignation at the sheer audacity of a mother to treat a child in such a manner. Death however waited for the opportune moment. The Muggle family would come to know him in their own time, and so he was patient as was his wont, but in the meantime, he prepared his sentries to look after his Appointed Mistress. No Child of Death would suffer the abuses felt upon them as Aster did, least of all a Child of the Peverells.

The next couple of days passed rather uneventfully. Aster got up, proceeded with her chores in the morning, and as it was the last week of school before they broke up for the summer, school itself was it's chaotic scramble to try and rein in children who had had their fill of learning for now. So when Aster woke up on Saturday to the sound of the letter flap closing, she sprang out and stared at the doormat from the vent slats in her cupboard door. And right on top she could see the tell take beige of the thick envelope with her name written in that old style loopy hand writing. She had learnt from her mistakes on Tuesday evening and so decided to take action. She had long since had taught herself how to jimmy the lock on the door from the inside; the idea came to her in one of her vivid dreams where a strange hooded figure used an elongated pin to hook over the bolt so it could slide it out of place. Of course that left trying to figure out how to get her hand, if not her arm, out enough to be able to get the movement to do so. She may have been skinny, but even she didn't have wrists the size of a small jar lid.

So one day, when she was locked in for some misdemeanour she no longer recalled, she stated at the vent, running through a myriad of ideas to get through the vent. All more fantastical than the last. Her favourite was throwing her hand out like Gandalf in a book she once read at the library and making the slats disappear altogether. When she was let out to go to school, she even walked to the edge of the playground to find a stick worthy enough of being her staff. Until Dudley and Piers knocked her down and inevitably broke it because she was a freak who shouldn't have anything for herself, even an innocuous thick stick. It probably didn't help that she whacked them on the back of their knees after they pushed her to the tarmac, leaving her with skinned palms.

She knew, on that dreary day locked in the claustrophobic cupboard with the small camping mat for a bed, her clothes neatly folded to one side; all 5 items, and the abundance of cleaning equipment and tools that she needed an actual plan on how to remove the slats. She sat with her back against the wall, watching Eddy the Spider make his usual rounds on the ceiling when it came to her. Her Uncle's tools. How she didn't think of it before she could only guess - although the lack of food and water likely had a contribution towards her ineptitude. She scrambled through his selection, picking out a flat bladed chisel like screwdriver and started prying open the gaps of two slats, enough for her to slip a hand through, even as she grew. Hopefully. So on that highly anticipated Saturday she slipped out the one slat that was needed and unbolted the door.

She slowly edged it open, just enough that she could check the coast was clear, before slipping out towards the doormat, her eyes darting left and right and up towards the stairs to ensure she wouldn't be caught. As soon as she was in reach, she snatched the one envelope and high tailed it back to the cupboard, making sure the remaining post didn't look disturbed, locked her door back up and wiggled the slats back into place. Nobody would ever know that another was sent in response to the first, she hoped.

Once she was sure that everything was back in its place, she reached a hand up to pull the cord so the light bulb could sputter to life, throwing everything in a sickly colour of off yellow. Shuffling around so that she was in her customary place with her back against the wall and the vent in direct eye line, she curled up into a relatively comfortable position as she shakily looked down at the letter she held. It was silly to get so worked up over such a small thing, yet even after telling herself that there would be a reminder letter didn't quell the fear that she would be forgotten. This was proof that she was thought about in more than a passing glance of disdain from her family, vague concern when strangers saw her do adults work, such as the food shopping, or the confusion of teachers who had obscure recollection of her being in their class but not quite able to say definitely what she looked like and what her strengths of weaknesses were academically.

As such, this nondescript item held a promise that she wasn't as unobserved as she had always thought. Due to its special nature, she greedily devoured every niche of the envelope, from the thick and beige colour of the material, the bright colour of the ink, the curious lack of a postage stamp, and the wax seal comprised of four animals with no relation to one another. After she delicately peeled the wax away, a sheaf of the same material slid out easily, in the same elegant script, and that was when she was crushed. Clearly this must be some prank of a kind. Witchcraft? Owls? Just because she had things happen around her, it didn't mean she was some form of witch, did it? But, on the other hand, Aunt Petunia had clearly recognised, and even appeared to be scared, of the previous letter sent to her. And Aunt Petunia was not the prank kind of woman, it was uncouth and vulgar. She even scolded her precious Dudders when he attempted to do things that could, on a very squinty eyed perspective, be considered be such an activity. Either way, what harm could a response do? If it was a prank, then an owl is hardly going to deliver any form of mail, and if by some miracle it does, well she can deal with the fallout later. Because, if it wasn't a joke, and she hadn't even attempted a reply, then she would surely be worse off.

And so, she scrambled for a pen and scrap piece of paper in her small horde of stolen goods from Dudley's second bedroom, she penned a reply, because goodness knows when she would find a mailing owl that would be able to deliver before the deadline of her birthday in one weeks time.

Her reply was basic; a brief acceptance, and apology of delay if needed. Hardly anything extraordinary but it was polite enough that if it was real, then it should give a good impression, and if it was a joke, then they could hardly accuse her of being so enamoured with the idea of this fantastical invitation. She would of course need to wait until she attempted to find an owl, if not just any bird, to deliver her acceptance. Although, how anyone, let alone an animal, would know where to go with just a name of a person and institution without an entire address was beyond her ten year old comprehension.

With her first business of the day finished, she maneuvered her way around so she could get properly dressed in a cast off t shirt from Dudley which she knotted at the hem so that the ratty skirt from the cheapest charity shop nearby didn't have an obvious under layer, and then socks which were more holey than any saint she had heard of (which admittedly wasn't many as the Church, according to her aunt and uncle, were money grabbing tight wads who took advantage of good people like themselves). Once she was as acceptable as possible, her hair quickly plaited to the vest of her ability, she slipped the letter down the front of her clothes, proceeded to ensure everything was out of sight and reach from her invasive relatives and her bedroom was once again tucked neatly away, she sat on the cold floor, waiting to be let put and the rest of her day to begin.

She was only waiting for approximately a half hour before the door was unceremoniously unlocked, a direction of what was to be made for breakfast and her list of chores pushed into her hands. Luckily there were enough jobs for the outside that when the time came she could meander her way to the very back of

the garden for any evidence of owls. She was not in luck however there was the recurring black bird, she couldn't tell if it was a crow or raven, that seemed to follow her about. So she took a chance.

Walking slowly towards it, with her hands stretched out so as not to scare it, she crept closer, watching as its pale blue eyes tracked her every movement with uncanny clarity. She knew it was the same bird as it still has the blue and white twine wrapped around its leg where she couldn't quite get close enough to cut it off, although it had recently let her remove another 2 inches off it.

Without knowing why, when Aster was about a metre away from it she ducked into a semi bow, mainly consisting of her head and shoulders before addressing it in a soft voice.

"Umm...hi...I don't suppose you can understand me, but...um, c-can you take this to" and here she had to check the nane of the professor again despite having read the name several times, "Professor McGo-McGonagell please?" The bird just looked at her, clacked its beak at her and twitched its head. Well now she definitely felt like an idiot. Talking to a frigging bird. Well done Aster, truly you are a scion of intelligence. Sighing to herself she looked around trying to find an alternative solution, when the bird clacked again and twitched it's head.

"What? What do you want?" Another jerk of the head. "I don't speak Bird, you know. What is it?" The bird then proceeded to stare at her as if she was a complete moron and then very slowly and purposefully jerked it's head again, pointing towards its talons. Well, that was unexpected.

"Oh. Right, gotcha." Still feeling rather silly she slid her feed slowly towards its foot where it grabbed the letter, clacked at her twice more and soared off.

Well at least now she'll know if birds are somehow sentient in ways previously unknown. Now she needed to know how to get the blasted school supplies.